Saturday, July 09, 2011

One of America's most intriguing show-business luminaries and true rebels, Dennis Hopper's amazing life was a roller-coaster series of triumphs and failures. Always intent on proving his genius and leaving a legacy, the Emmy and Oscar-nominated Hopper acted in more than 115 movies and four TV series, directed seven films, and passionately pursued an artist's life as a photographer and creator and collector of modern art, embracing the work of artists like Warhol and Lichtenstein before the label “pop art” was even coined. Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel explores Hopper's life from his lonely childhood in Kansas, where he became determined to win the affection of others by becoming a great artist, to his often drug-fueled days and nights in Hollywood and his spiritual home in Taos, New Mexico.

Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel unsparingly documents Hopper's journey from a self-destructive bad boy to a reformed member of the Hollywood establishment and iconic survivor of the counterculture, providing a revealing look at his early days in Hollywood, when he had an affair with sixteen-year-old Natalie Wood and took acting lessons from James Dean, the making of Easy Rider, the crushing failure of The Last Movie and his lost years in Taos, and his recovery and political right turn in the late 1980s. The book also delves into Hopper's tumultuous personal life, including his dramatic attempt to divorce his wife while he battled terminal cancer.

This is the first book to cover the entire life and career of the man who hung out with James Dean, Elvis Presley, and Jack Nicholson, costarred in and directed Easy Rider, and came back big in Blue Velvet, overcoming years of alcoholism and drug addiction. Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel is a must-read for Hopper's fans, film buffs, and readers hooked on celebrity scandals.

Peter L. Winkler is a respected film historian who has written for a variety of publications, including CineFan, crimemagazine.com, Filmfax, popmatters.com, and Playboy. He resides in North Hollywood, California.

Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel will be published by Barricade Books on August 16, 2011. The book can be pre-ordered now from Amazon.com and other booksellers.